The Commute

Vancouver, City of the Commute

Coming to a city like Vancouver, you learn to appreciate living in Nova Scotia. We worked in schools that were located in the suburbs while we lived in Dartmouth, so we were generally going against traffic going to work and coming home afterwards. My favorite was the year I worked out in Sackville. I would leave the house, head towards halifax, but turn off towards Bedford before hitting the traffic to Halifax. I would then head up the Magazine Hill all alone on the road facing a solid line of traffic on their way downtown. Coming home was the same, I'd leave the school, take the exit to the highway, and see a steady stream of people coming out of the city on their way home. No traffic jams, no waits, no frustration – it was great!

I recall being out here in Vancouver on another visit and was amazed at how much commuting was involved in living here, but this time we really noticed it. I think it was because there was so much construction and our friend picked us up from the airport and warned us about the interruptions and traffic delays all the way home. So, in between catching up on things, we were told about all the commuting horror stories. It was worse for them, because they just recently moved back out to the suburbs from an apartment right down-town. When they lived downtown there was no commute, and so the hour long daily drive which was just part of living in Vancouver before was suddenly a real pain in the butt!

Easy Commute - Water Taxi !

It is probably more obvious with people like our friends who commute all the time. They know all the problem areas and the short-cuts. It's on the freeway, off at this exit, down this back road, back onto the highway, avoid the bridge, through this short-cut, don't forget the construction on this section. I could never have duplicated the complicated route from their house to downtown Vancouver. We did get to see lots of British Columbia scenery on the way however.

"I don't do commute - I fly"

Now everything about the commuting wasn't negative. There is the entertainment value. Our friends do not always commute together, so have developed their own unique routes to minimize their commute. As a result there was a fair amount of; “Why are you going this way?”, Where are you going NOW?”, “Don't take this exit, it's a mess!”, AAAAH, didn't you remember all the roadwork down this road?”

But at least we did not have to drive . . . . . .

Names withheld to protect the guilty.